Wix to block Russian users starting September 12

Wix.com has announced it will stop providing services to Russian users on September 12, 2024, with all accounts from Russia, including free and premium, to be blocked and their websites taken down.

The popular website-building platform, owned by an Israeli firm, said this development was to adhere to new regulations. 

"As a result of the new regulations, we are required to restrict access to Wix services for Russian residents from September 12, 2024, and block their accounts," announced Wix.

"From this date onwards, you will no longer be able to access your Wix account or any services we provide."

Wix is a cloud-based drag-and-drop website-building platform that allows users to create blogging, small business sites, and online stores without needing coding skills or technical knowledge.

It offers a user-friendly interface, an extensive collection of templates, an app market to expand functionality, SEO tools, and dedicated e-commerce tools to handle payments and shipping.

Based on the announcement published on its site yesterday, any websites created by impacted accounts will be taken offline, so they will no longer be accessible by anyone in the world.

Impacted users who care to keep their websites are advised to transfer their domain to another registrar or hosting provider by September 12. After the deadline has passed, this will no longer be possible.

Detailed instructions on transferring a Wix domain outside the service are available here.

Those who are not Russian residents but reside in the country are given the option to apply for an exemption, which requires submitting proof of non-residency onto Wix's customer care platform.

Unfortunately, the review process will take a few working days. By this time, the deadline will have already been reached, so impacted sites need to be migrated elsewhere for safety anyway.

Wix's move to block Russian users and delete all accounts on such short notice, even those of paying users, comes soon after Notion announced a similar action.

The popular note-taking tool and productivity suite announced in late August that due to U.S.-government restrictions on software service providers, it would block access to all Russia-based users on September 9, 2024.